Sunday, August 29, 2004

Posted by
RFTR

Read, he commands youSo, obviously I've been a bit busy the past couple of days, moving back on campus. Now I'm settled, and I might have a little more time, but tomorrow and the next day are the days I'm working at the Convention, and classes start on Wednesday, plus I'm still unpacking. My point is, I'll be pretty busy over the next few days, but will blog as possible. In the meantime:

I haven't commented much on the Swift Boat Veterans kerfluffle, because I never thought they'd be very persuasive to the electorate at large. My thinking is, here's a bunch of guys who put out a book to attack a Presidential candidate, and publish a few TV ads on the subject. On the book side, the only people who will really pick it up are intellectuals and people who already support W. On the TV side, one more drop in the battleground-state bucket won't make much of a difference.

But last week, I started paying attention. Why? John Kerry challenged the President to condemn this group. Suddenly, SBV became important, because Kerry effectively hinged his entire campaign on Vietnam, yet again. He could have come out and said "These men are wrong, dead wrong, and they have no bearing on my campaign. I am not running merely because I served in Vietnam, or based one where and when I served there. I am running because I want to lead this country to a better tomorrow, through an honorable presidency. I want to return to our old allegiances, and guarantee cheaper, better healthcare for all Americans." and so on. Of course, he didn't do this, and instead challenged W to condemn the group.

This causes a serious problems for Kerry. For example, the open letter written to the Kerry campaign by the Bush campaign's Letter to John Kerry: "You can't have it both ways. You can't build your convention and much of your campaign around your service in Vietnam, and then try to say that only those veterans who agree with you have a right to speak up. There is no double standard for our right to free speech. We all earned it."

There is simply too much clear hypocrisy in this position from Kerry. Have you walked into a bookstore recently? For the past three months, one out of every five books on the "newly published" display at my local Borders has been anti-Bush. In that same amount of time, I've seen two pro-Bush, and the SBV book is the first anti-Kerry I've seen. Why hasn't Kerry condemned the authors of these books? I'll bet they're active in the Democratic Party (one of his claims against the SBV is that their leader has long been a "Republican operative," whatever that means). Better yet, MoveOn.org has people on its executive board who got those jobs immediately upon leaving their previous jobs at the DNC, the Dean campaign, or any other number of Democratic organizations. After accusing the Bush campaign of coordinating with SBV, based on a web of tenuous connections (i.e. SBV Joe Schmo is cousins with a janitor in the White House), why hasn't Kerry demanded that MoveOn disband in a similar fashion, or at the least condemning MoveOn?

A few liberals have said to me "Well, he did condemn the comparison of Bush to Hitler." Good for him, but I don't award points for taking action that should seem obvious to anyone with a brain. He's not asking Bush to condemn one ad, he's asking Bush to condemn the organization. As I've said before, I'd like to see a little equality on this. The problem is, Kerry can't provide me with that, and he's backed himself into a corner.

I hate to say it, but when Varifrank says: "There is no President in modern memory who is so universally hated than George W. Bush, and yet, you've never polled outside of the margin of error. Now, the polls are going against you, and by my measurement, its going to get worse, not better from here. Bush is a marathon runner and you are a country club golf cart riding, two caddy golfer. As long as you continue to bring your B game to an A game park, you and your party are going to look fools. At some point, you will begin to see your allies in your party and the press begin to make you the pinata at this party. They will not take the heat for your loss, they will tie a can around your neck and toss you out into the exercise yard for the guards to shoot at. Everyone loves a winner, but no one can stand a loser.
You sir, are a loser. You will go down in history as the man who made Dukakis look good." he might have a point.